Where do I find the words to begin? King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard (KGLW) are a psych-rock Aussie 7-piece who’ve made their mark on the genre with a total of 26 studio albums as of August 9th, 2024, with the newly released Flight b741. Coming off a European tour earlier this year, they now turn course for the United States. Along the tour, a collection of stops will be special 3-hour marathon shows where fans are treated to nonstop music from beginning to end. Forest Hills Stadium, located in Queens, New York, was blessed with back-to-back marathons for a total of six quick hours of music. Here’s my experience recounting just one night with King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard:.
We begin as we begin all things, in a Biergarten in Queens, surrounded by beings in tie-dye and jumpsuits. Four and a half hours before the doors of the stadium swung open, a fan meetup was hosted at Cobblestone’s Pub and Biergarten, organized by the Weirdo Swarm (the moniker given to the fan base). I walked through the back doors of the pub to the Biergarten and was welcomed into the swarm with arms wide open. I was quickly met by two fast friends, Kelly and James, who had flown up from South Carolina for both nights. When they heard this would be my first show and that I was shooting it, they immediately swarmed me with bracelets, stickers, and pins, calling over their friends who became mine, gifted me more stickers, and repeated. I filled my bag, ate good food, had great company, and then took a walk over to the vendors.
This would be the first meetup of many along the tour, hosting an array of ever-changing vendors selling bootleg merch consisting of shirts, posters, jewelry, prints, and more. Every artist in attendance was beyond talented. While window shopping the aisles of hand-sculpted earrings, limited edition prints, special edition posters, and hand-dyed shirts, I came across a pile that seemed to swipe an item from each vendor. This was the meetup’s “Raffle for the Gator Good,” a vendor donation-fueled raffle that made it possible to donate over $1000 in proceeds to the World Central Kitchen, a not-for-profit, non-governmental organization set on combating food insecurity around the world. Truly, the fans have my utmost respect, and I haven’t even begun my walk to the stadium.
When I did make my way over to the stadium, the crowd was already grooving to DJ Crenshaw, a cool cat who quietly sifted through his box of vinyl, providing music for fans exploring the venue and waiting in those far-stretching poster lines. Posters are a huge thing for Gizz, limited edition prints of posters designed for each stop of the tour, usually by the band’s artist Jason Galea. His work is phenomenal and graces most of the band’s album covers. Crenshaw would play before both the opener and the headliner of the night, providing a great atmosphere as excitement and crowds grew larger.
Priming the crowd would be Geese, a rock band from Brooklyn. I was immediately impressed by their vocalist, Cameron Winter. Opening with the first track of their 2023 album of the same name, 3D Country, we were introduced to the band with a cry from Cameron that continued through a crashing cacophony of strings and drums that blew me away. He has a voice that uses so much of his body’s energy that his hands are forced to float through the performance, shaking and pulling in as he expunges all the air in his lungs, contorting to the sides of the mic, just to carry on a note. The rest of the band is no different, sporting various stable and mobile guitars, synths, and keyboards. I was also captivated by their guitarist, Emily Green, who was just always on, and she shreds. During one song, I watched as she crouched right down in front of me, hovering over her pedals, shifting dials with one hand, on the other poking and prodding the strings with her fingers at a 90-degree angle before dragging them across the neck, the result being a screeching shrill that rang through the crowd, a sound of chaos, organized by her right hand on dials perfectly corralling the noise to integrate back into the other four members’ instruments. I really enjoyed hearing Cowboy Nudes live finally and highly recommend getting to the shows early to enjoy them.
Once the clock struck seven, the Weirdo Swarm would be locked in continuous music until ten, but before then, a message would shine on the stage, left by KGLW. It started, “As the Weirdo Swarm grows, we have to work hard to keep our community inclusive,” explaining their mosh pits are for people of any gender, size, or age. They continued to say, “If you see any dickheads, alert security. Look after each other in there and BE YOURSELF.” It was a fitting message for the thrashing metal that would fly their way in just an hour.
Before the pits would open, however, we were treated to history. Now I try to be unbiased in my reviews, kinda, but this is my favorite band, like at the top of my Spotify Wrapped for years, burning holes in my wallet with vinyl, secret Santa in the fanbase each Christmas, favorite band, and I witnessed a live debut. Field of Vision is a track off their most recent album, beginning with a guitar riff that hits your chest at full force and gives each band member credit for vocals.
What you have to understand is that these guys are not normal musicians; they’re freaks. They all play multiple instruments, everyone sings at some point in the discography, and multiple albums were released in one month, let alone the five they released in some years. Hell, they played music from TWELVE DIFFERENT ALBUMS, and there were still members (looking at you, Cookie, sorry *ahem* Cook Craig) I didn’t see grab a mic and instruments I never saw like Stu’s flute (kicked off night 2 with it though). All this to say, the artistry on stage is just not of the caliber I often see as a photographer, and the dedication these men have to their craft is not usual. Stu Mackenzie, the band’s frontman, personally keeps an Excel spreadsheet alongside the user-powered site, setlist.fm, to keep true to their promise to never repeat songs from the night before on a tour. Fans could and were accurately guessing large aspects of night two at Forest Hills based on what had already been played at the first two stops on the tour. This kind of dedication is only rampant in the fanbase because the band displays it. It’s mutual respect.
The Field of Vision jam would continue through the same album with Daily Blues before reaching back through their discography 12 years to pull forward Cut Throat Boogie from the 2012 release, 12 Bar Bruise (those 12’s gotta be good luck).
After a longer repeating loop, indicating a transition coming, the crowd roared in waves of recognition as the echoes of Gamma Knife emanated from Stu’s guitar. Unbeknownst to us, it’d be the first taste of a trough of trashing off of 2016’s Nonagon Infinity. Gamma Knife would bleed through People-Vultures and soak into Mr. Beat, marking a shift in the crowd from the spinning circles of thrash rock to a communal swaying of a bluesy turn. Following the shift was Boogieman Sam, a fittingly named groovy boogie that was the song to break even the stiffest security guard as I saw him lean to another and say, “These guys are actually pretty good, huh?”
As a quick sidebar, I was really impressed with Forest Hills’ security team. They had a night heavy with moshing and crowd surfers, and a pit packed tight with photographers. I was briefed multiple times throughout the night, they never stopped handing out water to the crowd or to us photographers, and they were willing to yell at photographers in a particularly overpacked section when one guard mentioned he couldn’t effectively do his job because of the lack of space. I even heard multiple fans expressing the same sentiment after the show. As the band said themselves, safety comes before fun, and security made sure of it.
After so easily navigating the already shifting genres and moods, the band never for a second lost control of the crowd, as Joey Walker called them back in with Work This Time off 2014’s Oddments. Upon its conclusion, it would be the first time the crowd was addressed with a “¡Muchas gracias!” from Joey, followed by, “Golly, golly, gosh, how are ya guys goin'?” Eight songs in and I see members of the band downing waters for the first time, just now getting a break from their instruments. It’d be short-lived, with a shoutout to Geese thanking them for opening, then Stu would step back to the mic and kick off what’s known as the Mind Fuzz suite.
The first four songs off 2012’s I’m In Your Mind Fuzz are always played as a foursome at concerts, meaning to the fans, hearing just those first couple of notes, meant the next fifteen minutes would be one of the swarm’s favorite runs of album sections. Featuring slapping bass from Lucas Skinner laid under the lulling repetition of chants from Stu, time begins to alter and the stretch of just four songs can feel like half a concert on their own. I can attest that it was NOT fifteen minutes, and they had to have put something in those songs.
The crowd would help with the next one, joining Joey’s voice with their collective to sing This Thing. Afterward, Joey would let out excess energy by dancing in place, shouting out Ray Gunn, the recently viral Australian “break dancer” and Olympian; raising his fist, he warned not to ever talk bad about her. The crowd would then get a taste of the violence he threatened with five back-to-back heavy hitters, beginning with Self-Immolate.
In the darkest shift of the night, circles of fans opened on the floor, sacrificing others light enough to be thrown atop the crowd and carried toward the band. Instruments were quieted as Michael Cavanagh raised his sticks, smashed a technically amazing two-minute drum solo, then signaled back into the depths of Self-Immolate, only before pulling us out again with another break of rapid drums, then headed forth into Organ Farmer. Mosh pits grow wider and more rabid as security stands atop the barricades for a better eye, mirroring the stone eagles that proudly sit atop the walls of Forest Hills Stadium. Cavs then shifts the crowd deeper into the thralls of metal, summoning Venusian 2, followed by Gila Monster and Flamethrower, the latter two off of the recently released Petrodragonic Apocalypse. Gila Monster features one of my favorite parts of Gizz, Ambrose Kenny-Smith’s iconic voice. Ripping the mic off his stand, he snakes his way out from behind his keys to the center stage, growling his lyrics to the crowd as Joey and Stu circle with him, avoiding the wire he now drags through the air like a ribbon.
As guitar riffs turned to cheers, Ambrose came over the mic to dedicate their next song to his good mate, Alex Harvey, whom the world recently lost. What followed were calls across the bowl as Amby began Straws in the Wind. Standing atop the speakers, he shared the mic with the crowd before turning it back on himself. Returning to the stage with lulling repetitions of guitar lines, drum loops, and chanting, Ambrose circled lyrics from beneath his table of keys and harmonicas. Anticipation swelled through the crowd, building and building before pouring itself back into the song’s latter half. Afterward, Ambrose would thank the crowd and residents of the city, which Stu echoed, followed by, “Residents of Forest Hills, I’m very sorry,” the same residents who just last year launched a lawsuit against the stadium for its “unbearably loud” noise.
Stu, recently equipped with his famous “Flying Microtonal Banana” guitar, would continue the collection of microtonal goodness. As Pleura and All Is Known passed by, we reached a set of songs from their 2017 album, aptly named after the guitar in Stu’s hand. Doom City begins, setting up a desolate landscape. Stu’s vocals are elastic, stretching from the earlier screams of metal to this very rhythmic lyricism that is just so fun to listen to. A fan’s sign would be floating above the crowd, painting creased fabric, stretching to read “MR. WALKER NUCLEAR FUSION,” the title of the track following this one on the album. That same fan, Gabby, would be called on stage by Joey himself to kick off the song with her best impression of the song’s long guttural opening growl. The crowd chanted her name, genuinely thankful as Nuclear Fusion was not on Stu’s carefully crafted setlist but instead was added via Sharpie earlier in the show, solely because Gabby asked for it, and I can’t thank her enough.
The last two songs of the night felt like a victory lap. "Rattlesnake" is a fan favorite track that repeats the song’s title endlessly as their sound swirls around you, constricting their hold on you. Bravest of the swarm will risk life and limb on the floor of the venue to do the “rattlesnake,” a similar dance to the worm. Above them slither crowd surfers creeping toward the band, all passing around an inflatable snake from surfer to surfer. K.G.L.W. would close the night with a chanting of the band’s acronym, branding the crowd with their signature lodged between their ears to rattle around their heads the whole way home.
With a thank you to the crowd and an exchange of setlists, cigarettes, picks, and drumsticks, we were cast out. In one mass, I walked through the Weirdo Swarm, hearing bits of conversation, recalling their favorite moment of the night, guessing what they’ll get to hear the next night, and laughing about the silly things Joey would say between songs. It continued down into the subway as everyone slowly dispersed through their different paths into the city, leaching the reach of their music further and further. Not many fanbases can set up meetups designed around charities, and not many will support a band that releases the array of thrash metal, blues rock, or psychedelic synth music that the band continuously experiments with. It’s a special sort of positive feedback loop, the creativity in the band that the fanbase welcomes bleeds through the encouraged bootleg artists who have sought community around the music. They both flourish because of one another.
The band cares so much about their show experiences that for their entire US tour, they are live streaming every show along the way for fans to experience, only missing shows that venues denied. I truly believe I was the only person I talked to all day long who wasn’t making it to the second night (even the security guard was telling me to skip whatever it was that would make me miss), but I can watch the full thing livestreamed on their YouTube channel with a fantastic team putting it together. To have such a strong fanbase, you have to invest in it, and KGLW always does.
True artists attract those who can appreciate it, and I seriously urge you to get to a show on this tour, but if you can’t, check out a stream. King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard are a once-in-a-lifetime group of artists, and to experience them is to experience music authentically. Mark my words, they are one of the greats.
